ces (which ordinarily
terminate in a quarrel about the shade of a ponceau ribbon, or a mauve
flower, or a cornet's eyes, some three months after the signing and
sealing thereof), was of course to be one of the _filles d'honneur_. So,
as I said to Telfer, he'd have time for a few more battles before the
two enemies parted to meet again--nobody could tell when.

I began to think that the Major had really been wounded, and that his
opponent's bright eyes wouldn't let him come out of the fight wholly
scathless, as I saw him leaning against the wall at a ball in the
Redoute at Pipesandbeersbad, watching Violet with great earnestness as
she whirled round in a _deux temps_, bewitching as was her wont all the
frequenters of the Bad. Rich English dyspeptics, poverty-stricken
princes, Austrian diplomats, come to cure their hypochondria; French
_decores_, to try their new cabals and martingales; British snobs, to
indulge the luxury of grumbling,--all of them found some strange
attraction in the "Violette Anglaise."

Violet sank on a seat after her valse. Telfer quietly displaced a young
dragoon from Lucca, and sat down by her.

"I am going to stay on another month, Miss Tressillian; are you not
sorry to hear it?" he said, with a smile, but I thought a little anxiety
in his eyes.

The color flushed over her face, and she answered, with a laugh, not
quite a real one: "Of course I am very sorry. I would go away myself to
let you enjoy your last week in peace if I were not engaged to Virginie.
Cannot you get me leave of absence from her? I know you would throw your
whole heart into the petition."

Telfer curled his moustaches impatiently.

"Truth has come out of her well at last," he said, with a dash of
bitterness, "and has disguised herself in Miss Tressillian's tulle
illusion."

Violet colored brighter still.

"Well," she said, quickly, "was it not your decision that we should
never waste courtesy on one another? Was not your own desire _guerre a
outrance_?"

"No," answered Telfer, his brow darkening; "that I certainly must deny.
I did you injustice, and I offered you an apology. No man could do more
than acknowledge he was in the wrong. I offered you the palm-branch
once; you were pleased to refuse it. I am not a man, Miss Tressillian,
to run the chance of another repulse. My friendship is not so cheap that
I shall intrude it where it is undesired." He spoke with a laugh, but
his eyes had a grave anger in them that Vio